


heaven help a fool who falls in love

by TrenchcoatRats



Category: Happy Death Day (2017)
Genre: Alternate Timeline Tree Is Bisexual, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Developing Friendships, Developing Relationship, F/F, Female Friendship, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-05-22
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:07:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24314785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrenchcoatRats/pseuds/TrenchcoatRats
Summary: After the timeloop closes, alternate Tree's side. There's so much she doesn't understand, so much that's happened that apparently she has no memory of. But she won't say no to a friendly face and a shoulder to lean on. She won't say no to a hand to hold.
Relationships: Dre Morgan/Theresa "Tree" Gelbman, Theresa "Tree" Gelbman/Lori Spengler
Comments: 3
Kudos: 14





	heaven help a fool who falls in love

Tree wakes up on cold, unforgivingly hard floor. It’s arguably the third worst place to wake up after a night of partying and drinking. Her head’s pounding, not helped by the industrial lights overhead. Maybe she drank a bit  _ too  _ much last night, took some dumbass dare to break into one of the rooms of the engineering building, wouldn’t be the first time she’d done something that stupid. She looks to the side and sees three other people stumbling to get up, her fellow conspirators she guesses.

“Man, sissy does  _ not  _ pull any punches does she?” A boy groans out, getting to his feet and pausing when he sees Tree. If he was calling her a sissy, she’d throw him right back to the ground. “Aw shit, what’d we mess up this time?”

She gives him a puzzled look and opens her mouth to tell him to start making sense, but she’s cut off before she can make a sound.

“Oh what  _ didn’t  _ you three mess up would be the better question! I think I’ll have you three hauled away by campus security and make you pay for your damages to the school before we finally expel you all!” The words are slightly muddled, like the speaker has a bad cold, but it makes Tree’s head throb mercilessly. She groans from her spot on the floor and there’s a weighted silence.

“Who the hell is that?!”

Tree looks over blearily, deciding to stand up to tell the man exactly who she was and kindly ask him to shut the fuck up. She makes it about halfway before she stumbles and falls. Thankfully, she’s caught before her skull makes contact with the floor. That would’ve been a bummer.

“Uh she was here doing her homework, sir. She must’ve gotten knocked out when you guys busted in here, think she’s got a concussion.” The person holding her says, gently starting to make their way out of the room with her. They seem to have it handled, so she keeps quiet, closing her eyes tightly against the bright room.

Maybe she has a concussion, maybe she’s hungover, maybe both. Either way she feels like shit and wants to get out of here.

She keeps her eyes shut, hoping to just get away from it all. When they stop, she’s gently guided into sitting down. Tree can hear birds chirping, but the cool air lets her know that at least she’s in the shade.

“Alright, no more bright lights. I  _ really  _ hope you don’t have a concussion, though, that’d really suck, especially since you’ve already died like a lot and--wait, you’re our Tree right?”

She opens her eyes to see her chatty savior. Curly hair, eyesore of a button up and a grey top underneath, pretty eyes. “Who else would I be?” 

Pretty eyes smiles, “Let’s hope you never find out. I’m Dre, by the way.” She holds her hand out for Tree. She smiles at it before grabbing onto it with her own.

“Tree, but, you already knew that.” Dre snickers and Tree’s smile slides into something closer to a proud smirk.

“So, what happened?” 

Dre makes a face and makes a waving motion with her hand. “Bit of this, bit of that. Um, you might have a concussion, or just shock. Our lab had a bit of an explosion and it looks like you were caught up in it.”

“What was I even doing in your lab? I’ve never been to this building before.”

Before Dre can answer her phone starts buzzing. She pulls it out and takes the call, giving Tree an apologetic expression. 

“Hey, what’s good?” Her face morphs into alarm. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down, Carter.  _ What  _ happened at the hospital?” Carter evidently has a lot to say and almost none of it good. She sits down next to Tree, looking shocked as Carter keeps talking. Tree squeezes Dre’s hand in comfort but she doesn’t seem to notice.

“Yeah, yeah, I-I’ll call you back soon, I promise. We’ve got a situation over here, though. Alright, call you later.” She puts her phone back in her pocket with a loud exhale.

“Everything alright?”

Dre jumps as if she’d forgotten about Tree. She moves to bring her hand up to her heart but stops when she realizes their hands are still joined and lets go with an awkward laugh. Tree wishes she hadn’t spoken, that she could’ve held Dre’s hand for just a bit longer.

“I mean, it’s not  _ not  _ alright. Lab squad might be facing expulsion, definitely going to get some sort of punishment from this. And apparently...you kinda got into a gun fight with a murderer. Two murderers. Three? Carter was a bit panicked. Point is: you two got shot at, you shot one murderer, another one got shot but not by you, and also a nurse got shot? Carter said she’s one of your sorority sisters, she’s alive. Just, in surgery right now.” 

Tree freezes. 

Lori.

She’d known Lori since their freshman bio class and while they’d never been close as classmates, as roommates their friendship had really become something strong. They’d have  _ Clue  _ or old Muppet movies playing in the background while they studied and always try to “surprise” the other with a birthday cupcake when the day rolled around. Danielle's never found out, but Tree and Lori had been making a game out of sending each other snaps of Danielle during house meetings, seeing who could try to make the other break first.  


Tree’d never made a move on it, but she’d called her mom early one morning near in tears as she told her that she had a crush on her roommate. Her friend, arguably her best friend since she started college. Tree was confident in her bisexuality, but that didn’t mean she was out to her sisters, or that she wanted to spring that on Lori. From how tired and jumpy she’d been looking at her phone lately, Lori's had enough problems on her plate with relationships without Tree throwing that curveball at her.

It wasn’t a crush so bad she wanted to scream every time Lori so much as looked at her, so much as a gentle sigh at the idea of getting to hold her hand, maybe lay next to her during their next movie marathon. 

Feelings aside, or maybe especially feelings considered, her best friend had been  _ shot  _ and Tree may or may not have been there to help her, might have never even noticed with the killers on the loose, and  _ why couldn’t she remember? _

“Hey, hey! Tree, it’s okay. Everything’s kinda shitty right now but I need you to listen. Breathe deep and slow for me, okay? Your friend isn’t in any life or death situation. She’s expected to make a full recovery and Carter said she was good to talk to you for a bit before they took her away.”

Tree lets out a shaky breath, “Why can’t I remember what happened? I-I don’t remember any of this happening, how could I forget something like that?” Her voice cracks and she lets out a sob.

“Because what happened was probably terrifying? Like, pants shittingly terrifying. If you blocked it out, that’s probably a good thing. You’ll probably be able to see her tomorrow and things will be alright, I  _ promise _ .”

Tree nods and wipes her eyes with her shirt sleeve, wincing as she sees the mascara there.

“Sorry, today’s just been a lot. Apparently.”

Dre waves off the apology. “Don’t even worry about it, Tree.”

Tree smiles at her in thanks and Dre beams back. Her heart gives a little flutter at the sight. Lori’s got enough to deal with, Tree’ll be supporting her as her friend and that’ll have to be enough. So this is okay, right? It’s okay to feel a little bit in love meeting someone for the first time?

Feeling like, even though you’ve only known each other for essentially no time, that you want to learn more about them, to see them happy, to smile like that, to smile like that at you? That’s okay, isn’t it?

Tree holds her hand out to Dre, who stares at it in confusion.

“I’ve had a really shitty day and I’m probably going to have to call my parents about it at some point but, are you free? It may sound awful, but I’m  _ starving  _ right now. And I was thinking that some good food and good company would be really appreciated. My treat.”

Dre lights up before grabbing Tree’s hand. “Sounds great! The further I get away from that mess the better, I can pretend I’ll be allowed on campus for a bit longer. Heads up: I’ve got a bottomless pit of a stomach.”

Tree laughs and stands up, bringing Dre up with her. “You’re in luck then, I have a bottomless pit of dining dollars at my disposal.”

“Sounds like a plan!” And as they walk towards the dining hall, still holding hands, Tree thinks that things, or rather the current state of life and her world, may not be okay. But this? This was  _ more  _ than okay.

**Author's Note:**

> And then Dre and Tree bought Lori flowers in the hospital and after she physically and emotionally recovers from the Awful breakup to rule all awful breakups, the three of them start dating B^)


End file.
